Chapter Twenty-Nine
K itty goggled.
She needed to be planning, running, stabbing Portsmouth.
But she still goggled uselessly, wasting a full minute she would berate herself for later. “Lady Portsmouth?”
Caroline nodded.
“Why are—Never mind that now. How do you know where your husband is taking my sister? And will you go with us? We need you. She needs you.” It was selfish to ask, but Kitty didn’t care.
Caroline nodded, though she trembled. “I’ve hidden long enough. I saw your message at the oak, and I’ve seen you try to help me even when you did not know me and I was not brave enough to ask for that help. But I will be brave enough to help your sister.”
“Thank you,” Kitty breathed, nearly lightheaded with relief. “You may be the first to stab him.”
“Thank you?”
“Where is he taking her?” Priya asked, motioning to Pierce through the glass. He was striding toward her before her arm dropped back down. “Gretna Green?”
Caroline shook her head. “Not this time, not when he knows you might follow. Gretna Green was to force your sister’s hand, to ruin her so she had no choice once they reached Scotland.”
“I did not know it was possible to want to stab someone quite so much.”
“Believe me, I understand.”
“I would rather my sister’s reputation be ruined than she be murdered. But if not Gretna Green, where? The banns have not been read. I have been checking the papers.”
“He wouldn’t do it that way, not now that eyes are upon him. Not nearly elegant enough.”
“Yes, because abducting women and murdering his wives is very elegant indeed,” Kitty said.
They exchanged a cutting, killing glance.
“He’s found someone to force into giving him a special license,” Caroline continued. “It’s what he does.”
“So we’ve discovered.” Fat lot of good those secret letters were at the moment.
“I have been following his men. He went to the archbishop’s offices at Doctors’ Commons and had them procure a special license today.”
“There are too many bishops and vicars in London.”
“Yes, but only one he is blackmailing. He lives not far from here.”
“I have a carriage,” Priya said.
“But I have a Winchester brother,” Kitty replied. “He’ll get us there faster.”
Which was how Kitty found herself climbing into a carriage with Priya and Caroline, and Pierce and Wulf acting as outriders.
“We should send for Devil,” Wulf said.
“Go ahead,” Kitty replied. “But I cannot wait. Not one moment.”
Wulf swore under his breath before climbing aboard. “Devil will find us. He’ll find y ou .”
Kitty could not see how that was even possible, but it did not matter. She had her makeshift army: spinsters and wives on the run and men who did not care about her lack of fortune. Or which dessert spoon to use.
Lord Portsmouth would not have her sister.
“Portsmouth is a self-important ass,” Caroline said a few moments later as the carriage careered down the busy street with very little regard for order.
“Clearly,” Priya said. “Well done on surviving him.”
“I nearly didn’t,” Caroline said. “He was courteous enough at first, played the role of suitor well enough. But after we married, each time I got my courses, he flew into a rage. He is obsessed with getting an heir.” She shook her head. “And then a doctor told him I was barren because it had been a year without a baby.”
Priya snorted. “It has been far longer than that for him, including three wives, and I shudder to think of how many other women. Of course, the problem could not possibly lie with him .”
Caroline pressed her lips together. “The one doctor who suggested that went missing. I decided I should go missing as well shortly after.”
The carriage rolled to a stop just down the street from the vicar’s house, partially hidden in a line of other carriages waiting outside of a supper party gone late. The stars were very far away, and the moon was barely a suggestion of light. But it was enough for Pierce to nod grimly to a rooftop across from the vicar’s house.
“One of Portsmouth’s men up there with a rifle,” he said. “Don’t move until I’ve dealt with him.” He caught Priya’s eye. “I mean it.”
He was gone before she could reply, melting into the shadows. Kitty knew without looking that he was far more graceful on a rooftop than she was. There was a muffled grunt, the slide of a body on slate tiles. “He’s got him,” Wulf said.
Priya handed Kitty a dagger.
“Stop giving away your knives, woman,” Pierce said, still across the street.
“I have two more,” she muttered. “Honestly, if it were up to him, I would be wearing them like jewelry.”
“We’ll take the others,” Wulf said. “There are at least two out front.”
It hardly needed to be said that Kitty, Priya, and Caroline did not wait. Not long, at any rate.
Just long enough for Wulf and Pierce to clear a temporary path.
Kitty slipped past them, skirted a spatter of blood, and barreled through the front door.
Not her best plan.
But if she had to throw herself bodily onto the earl to stop him, she would. Stabbing was, of course, a distinct possibility.
The vicar’s house was dark, except for the candlelight spilling from a small parlor. Kitty headed straight for it, already knowing what she would find: Lord Portsmouth, a handsome earl of good fortune and tainted soul, standing next to her little sister. Evie’s hair glowed gold like a storybook princess’s. Her cheeks were pale, her chin at a determined angle.
Until she saw her sister. She closed her eyes briefly. “Kitty, don’t.”
The vicar and his wife—and the housekeeper and footman serving as the two witnesses—looked on stiffly. Kitty recognized then: the vicar Andover and his wife. Anyone could see this was wrong, even them. Evie was too pale, too young, too alone.
“Evie!” Kitty darted forward, terrified that she was too late.
“Not another step, Miss Caldecott,” Portsmouth ordered her. He grabbed Evie by the arm. Hard.
Kitty halted. Evie shook her head once, and Kitty nearly wilted with relief. Not too late, after all. She did not know where Caroline was, or the others, and she dared not look. She was a fox trapped in a foxhole. Let him hunt her and leave the rest.
“You were not invited,” Portsmouth said. “But no matter. She’s overjoyed to be my countess, aren’t you, Miss Evangeline?”
“Yes,” Evie whispered, shifting in pain. The bastard had taken away her cane.
“There. You see? Now kindly stop these dramatics, Miss Caldecott.”
“She’s only marrying you because you threatened me.”
He shrugged. And then he smiled. He liked the fear bubbling around him. Loved it. Kitty wondered how she was not spitting fire. The rage that filled her was hot as molten iron, just waiting to be formed into a weapon.
In the books she loved, the heroine always felt vindicated. Purposeful. Kitty just felt nervous and sweaty. And furious.
But Portsmouth was out of reach, and she wasn’t convinced she could get to her sister before him. No matter how angry she was.
She could, however, punch a vicar right in the mouth.
With no vicar, there was no one able to marry them. It would not solve the problem, but it would buy them time.
Kitty whirled on her heel, closed her fist, and let loose.
The vicar, currently trying to become a part of the furniture along with his wife, yelped. The housekeeper screamed and then fainted. Kitty punched him again even though pain flared through her hand. His teeth cut into his lip with a satisfying rush of blood, and then he too crumpled. She glared at Portsmouth. Even he was shocked that she would dare punch a man of the cloth. She would happily punch anyone trying to hurt her sister. Hopefully not very soon, as her hand hurt more than she would have guessed.
“Well, you can’t marry her now,” she said more smugly that was wise.
“I can do as I like, you stupid chit.” Portsmouth lifted his arm, pistol trained suddenly on Kitty. “Your sister marries me or she watches you die right here. It’s simple enough even for you to understand.”
“Please don’t,” Evie begged. “I’m already here. I’ve already said I’ll marry you.”
Kitty swallowed. She did not know very much about pistols, but she imagined it would be hard for him to miss entirely at such close quarters.
“I’ve made the announcement; there are bets in the books at my club. I have the license and the vicar. I’ve waited long enough—we can wait a bit longer for him to wake up.”
“You’ll have to wait a long bloody time,” Caroline interrupted quietly. “You can’t marry her because you’re still married to me .”
Portsmouth frowned at the sound of her voice. “If it isn’t my missing wife,” he said, eyes narrowing to slits. “You should have stayed missing, my dear.”
“Then your heir would be a bastard,” Caroline pointed out. “What would all of your exalted ancestors say to that?”
The vein on Portsmouth’s temple began to throb. It was an alarming shade of purple. Then he smiled again and Kitty’s spine went cold. When the mask slipped, he was truly terrifying. It was suddenly easy to see his soft and pampered hands covered in the blood of his wives.
“This problem I can remedy easily enough, at least,” he said.
Kitty saw his shoulder twitch before he moved. A tiny, brief warning.
He released Evie and swung the pistol toward Caroline, pulling the trigger.
Kitty was also swinging out, bringing her bruised hand down onto his forearm with all her might. The bullet fired, an explosion of sound and plaster as it hit the wall. A framed portrait fell from its hook, knocking into a glass vase of carnations. Caroline dropped, as did Priya. Kitty could not tell if either of them had been hit.
The pistol skittered under the settee.
“Evie, run!” Kitty shouted.
Evie, being a Caldecott sister and therefore stubborn to a fault, did not run. She merely backed up a step and grabbed for the fireplace poker. Portsmouth did not immediately notice. His ire was focused on Kitty, who had ruined his plans. With glee. And would happily continue to do so for as long as she lived.
Poor choice of words.
While Kitty was glancing between her sister and Priya and Caroline in a heap, Portsmouth launched himself at her. He grabbed the front of her dress and yanked her off her feet, shaking her like a cat with a mouse. Kitty’s head snapped back, disorienting her.
And then she knew exactly where she was, trapped against Portsmouth while he held a dagger to her throat.
He was breathing hard in her ear, furious and frustrated. “This ends now,” he seethed. He smelled like cologne, too sweet and too thick. It made her want to sneeze. She did not dare. “No one cares about a spinster, least of all one like you.”
“I think that’s where you’ll find you are wrong.”